Refugees boat

The European Commission on Friday (7 December) said more people were dying at sea because smugglers are using less seaworthy boats. "What we are seeing here is a change of the modus operandi of the smugglers who are now no longer using the same type of vessels," a Commission spokeswoman told reporters. The spokeswoman did not say why, noting that close to 700,000 lives have been saved since 2015. In September, she had offered an almost identical explanation. But the omission as to why points to a commission that is dealing in half truths. In fact, EU policy is in part responsible for making those boats more dangerous. Up until last year, the EU's naval operation Sophia had seized over 500 refugee boats. Many more are likely to have since been captured. By destroying these boats, it forces people to turn to less seaworthy and more dangerous alternatives. Europe's regional director for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), Eugenio Ambrosi, offered a similar explanation. … [Read more...] about [EUobserved] EU Commission spins half-truth on ‘unsafe’ refugee boats

Nora Azzaoui first left Germany for Greece in the winter of 2015 to volunteer on the beaches of Chios. It was the height of the refugee crisis: tens of thousands of people, mostly from Syria, had landed in Chios that year. Many of the boats came at night. If the seas had been rough, the migrants could be soaking wet and covered in fuel, or worse. As volunteers, Azzaoui and her friend Vera Günther were part of the operation to provide clean, dry clothes to people as soon as they landed. After landings, the volunteers cleaned the beaches, picking up the discarded clothes and the broken boats and throwing everything away. Months later, back in Germany and still haunted by what they had seen in Chios, the friends searched for a way to do something meaningful to help. They had brought back a scrap of discarded plastic boat from Greece and gave it to a tailor, who sewed it into a bag. Azzaoui and Güther saw the product had potential. Over several months and countless workshops, … [Read more...] about The Berlin project where migrants make refugee boats into bags

The Aquarius, a rescue ship in the Mediterranean carrying 629 people, is now on its way to Spain, after being refused docking in Italy and Malta. The crisis has caused a diplomatic row between France and Italy and highlighted the stalemate within the EU on asylum policy. Sadly, there have been many historical examples of boats laden with refugees, that were refused docking. In the aftermath of World War II, the historian Eugene Kulischer wrote: “The refugee is the first peaceful immigrant”. Yet since then, refugees fleeing dictatorships, war and revolution have become the post-war order’s persistently inconvenient immigrant. The detention system that continues to hold them in limbo has expanded in response, as has the language that marks their exclusion: the “uprooted”, the “unwanted”, “the illegals”, and the “boat people”. These terms, and the UN Refugee Convention of 1951 that was intended to protect them, induced … [Read more...] about From the St Louis to Aquarius: history of refugee boats

Amsterdam, Netherlands - The narrow canals of Amsterdam are overloaded with purpose-built tourist boats but two stand out from the crowd. The tall red Alhadj Djumaa and its sister-boat, the smaller, blue-licked Hedir are conspicuous not only for their size but also their stories. Both boats are, like their tour guides and captains, not from here. The Alhadj Djumaa, or Mr Friday as it is now known, was picked up in July 2013 by Italian authorities in the middle of the Mediterranean carrying 217 Eritreans and 282 Ethiopians to the Italian island of Lampedusa; the Hedir was picked up on the same route in August 2015. Dutch artist Teun Castelein and founder of Lampedusa Cruises discovered the boats at the Italian island. "There are so many boats there," he says of the island where many arrive in search of a better life. Several refugees have led the canal cruises in Amsterdam [Courtesy: Mediamatic] Castelein brought the boats to Amsterdam and repurposed them to offer tours … [Read more...] about From life-threatening refugee boats to canal cruises in Amsterdam

The Greek coast guard launched on Monday a search and rescue operation off the southern coast of Crete for a wooden boat with 45 refugees and migrants reportedly onboard. According to the state-run news agency ANA-MPA, one of the passengers called the 112 emergency number and reported that the boat was in distress. Three coast guard vessels and an aircraft of EU border agency Frontex are participating in the operation which is focusing on the sea area off Kali Limenes, a village at the southernmost point of the island, in the regional unit of Heraklion. … [Read more...] about Coast guard searching for refugee boat off southern Crete